OUR VIEW: Technology advances need good judgment

With advances in communication technology, many people now have the opportunity to record every aspect of their lives, but a little discretion can prevent any number of difficulties, including criminal charges.

That everyone with smartphones now can take photographs or videos of themselves and those around them doesn't mean that they should, and even if they decide to do so, that they should keep the images on file.

In the past few days, a former dorm assistant at Middle Tennessee State University received a jail sentence for taking videos in a dorm shower and a county teacher received a reprimand for displaying to his class an image of a partially naked person.

More serious allegation here, in Nashville and around the country involve videos of assaults and rapes.

They raise questions not only about this violence itself but the thinking of those who would commit such acts to digital memories for others, include law enforcement officers, to observe.

Some contend that first the Internet and now social media essentially have destroyed any expectations of privacy, but use of these amazing new communication tools has to have boundaries.

Laws in regard to audio and video taping are behind the times and rapid advances in technology. They also differ among jurisdictions, but the Tennessee statute is specific in regard to still photographs and videos.

"It is an offense for a person to knowingly photograph or cause to be photographed an individual, when the individual is in a place where there is a reasonable expectation of privacy, without the prior effective consent of the individual, or in the case of a minor, without the prior effective consent of the minor's parent or guardian, if the photograph" is embarrassing to the ordinary person or was taken for sexual arousal.

Display of such photographs and videos could fall under standards involving the exercise of good taste or other standards that may involve the display of sexual content.

The First Amendment guarantee of freedom of expression should not be weakened because some people decide to encroach on the privacy and security of others either through taking their images or displaying these images to others.

As schools improve the access of students to such communication tools, school officials and parents need to spend some time on the ethics of using these tools.

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OUR VIEW: Technology advances need good judgment

With advances in communication technology, many people now have the opportunity to record every aspect of their lives, but a little discretion can prevent any number of difficulties, including